A few months ago, I posted about Indigenous Tweets, a site that tracks 82 languages.
The site recently celebrated turning six months old with the launch of a new service tracking blogs written in indigenous languages. Currently it only tracks blog posts on Blogger but plans are afoot to also track other popular blog services.
A great feature is being able to follow a bundle of blogs using an RSS reader like Google Reader. This means that you can follow all blogs for a particular language without having to subscribe to them individually. You can also subscribe to individual blog feeds if you feel the bundles are too much.
This is a fantastic resource for finding new material in your target language and also hopefully a subject you’re interested in. Why not try commenting on blog posts in your target language?
In good news for Native American languages, Google has made Cherokee a “searchable” language.
Although Google won’t translate Cherokee websites into English or English websites into Cherokee, content written in Cherokee can now be found using the search engine. An on-screen keyboard will allow characters to be typed in the Cherokee alphabet, known as the “syllabary”. The development comes after Google spent over a year working with translators from the Cherokee Nation.
Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chad Smith hailed it as a major victory in the tribe’s battle to preserve its ancient language.
“Language is like a muscle. It has to be exercised in order to stay healthy and grow stronger,” Smith told the Tulsa World.
“This is one more tool for people, especially young people, to exercise their language.”
“No one really knows how much content is out there because it’s never been searchable before,” he said.
“This will make what is already there more accessible, and at the same time, it will be an incentive to create more Cherokee content.” (Source: Tulsa World)
There is debate in colleges across America about the status of American Sign Language, according to an article in the Chicago Tribune.
Whilst some view it is a foreign language, and thus available for college credit, others argue that an indigenous language cannot by definition be ‘foreign’. ASL has origins in Old French Sign Language, and was developed at the American School for the Deaf in Connecticut. Because of its origins, it is noticeably different to sign languages of other English-speaking countries such as Britain, where British Sign Language is used. According to a study by the Modern Language Association it is the fourth most studied language at colleges other than English.
Some educators argue that as it doesn’t have the written or cultural components of a language like Spanish or French, ASL cannot be considered for credit. However:
Timothy Reagan, an education professor at Central Connecticut State University, said American Sign Language has a rich tradition of poetry, history and culture that shouldn’t be dismissed.
“One of the worst things you can do to a human being is to say, ‘Your language doesn’t count,’” he said.
For potential ASL students across the nation, as well as language commentators, this debate is sure to be watched closely.
